Well I have been BUSY, BUSY, BUSY, and the biggest thing keeping me busy these days is HOMESCHOOL! Theron and I are coming up on one year with K12 online education, and I’m ready to talk about it.
Our Reasoning for Trying K12 Online Education
This year has been a crazy one for every one with COVID. However, this seemed to be magnified by our move back to our hometown, a new baby, and YES, figuring out school.
With schools going virtual because of COVID, then opening, going virtual, then opening again… this year was bound to be different no matter what. My son was going into Kindergarten, and I knew that the back and forth and lack of consistency would just be really hard. I thought it might be the right time for us to try to homeschool.
I recently became a stay-at-home mom (if you follow this blog, you already know!), and I’ve always wanted to give homeschooling a try. However, I was not planning on trying it with a breastfeeding newborn. Registering a homeschool and a lot that goes along with homeschooling did not interest me so much. I just wanted to be able to teach my kids at home. The idea of having materials, lessons, and even online classes to go with it seemed appealing.
This is where K12 came in!
What is K12 Online Education?
Before I even thought being a stay-at-home mom would ever be a possibility for us, I had actually looked into online public school for our kids. I had looked at the different options for schooling at home and wondered about online public school.
I liked that online school was pretty flexible and FREE! But It was always just a “what if…” “maybe someday…” idea. Well, COVID really pushed that idea into reality.
I knew that my kids were probably going to be doing online schooling anyway, so I figured, let’s enroll them in a school that does knows how to do it! K12 is always online. It’s not new to them. Their teachers have experience with this.
Essentially, K12 online education is a public school that is completely virtual. It does not cost money (public school) and materials are provided.
I think that it’s important to talk about it the way we talk about homeschool because even though your child is enrolled in a school, the parents or “learning coach” is in charge of a lot of the teaching. You are given lesson guides to follow.
The student logs on to see what work they have for the day. Each day, Theron has some online classes with his teacher (usually 2 or 3) and a to-do list of lessons. Most lessons are either online activities or a combination of offline teaching from the learning coach and online practice.
Pros and Cons
So… How did it go?
Just like anything, it’s probably not for everyone. However, we loved it!
Pros
We’ll start with what we liked about K12.
First, I LOVED not packing all my kids up to take one kid to school. Theron had gone to school the two years prior and even when I was a SAHM, that still meant getting both (at the time) ready. In winter, the kids had to bundle up, get boots on, then unbundle for carseats… THEN when we got to school, since Theron was not old enough to just be dropped off, I had to rebundle both/all children (pregnant/with a newborn) walk everyone in, and so on and so on.
I’m sure you get where that’s going. Basically, the fact that we woke up, ate, brushed teeth, got dressed, then just walked up to our “classroom” was incredible.
Second, there is some freedom when school is online. If we needed to we could have stayed at a relative’s house, or even travelled and still attended school.
We were required to log in and attend a couple of classes a day and to complete the online work. I sometimes even rearranged the work to fit our schedule. Or if Theron was having a bad day, I could push some of the lessons back.
Third, materials were provided! This is not unusual for a brick and mortar public school, but for parents considering homeschooling, one of the biggest things to think about is investing in the learning materials.
K12 sent us all the books, equipment, manipulatives, etc.
Fourth, one-on-one instruction! We all know that students learn best when they get individualized teaching. Although we were following a curriculum and schedule set by the school, I could spend longer on something or add supplemental instruction to really help him in areas that he needed more time with. The schedule was what we made it!
Cons
There are a couple of downsides to doing online school, but a lot of it really depends on the student and family.
First, socializing…. As a high-schooler, I would have LOVED to have done online school. I would have been able to just get my work done in the comfort of my own room. I always felt like if they just gave me the lesson and the work, I would be just fine.
However, many kids rely on school for their social lives. A lot of kids thrive on interaction. So online school would seem like torture to them.
As with any homeschool situation, it really is up to the parents to find ways to give their kids opportunities to make friends and socialize. For some, this is easy if they have a lot of extra-curricular activities.
We’re kind of home bodies so I had to make a conscious effort here. We enrolled the kids in gymnastics and made more play dates, but I’ll admit, my kids mostly are each other’s best friends.
So this is certainly a con if you are not super social like us. But for many, this is a non-problem.
Second, internet going down can cause some issues. If you don’t have reliable internet, that is something to consider. This was rarely an issue for us.
Third, YOU ARE THE TEACHER. Yes, my son has a teacher that he does online classes with, but for kindergartners, there is almost no such thing as “independent work.” The offline lessons are taught by the parent or learning coach. But again, these lessons are provided and simple enough to follow.
I think some parents go into it thinking it was just like regular school, but on the computer. They are unpleasantly surprised by how much they are expected to participate.
Since I went into it knowing what to expect and as someone who was using this as an alternate homeschool option, I was not bothered by this.
As for older kids, I think this is less of an issue. As a self motivated teen, my mom would probably have very little involvement in my schooling if I had done K12 growing up.
The Verdict
So overall, I was very happy with our decision to enroll Theron in K12. We were able to have a lot of family time and explore other skills. It wasn’t perfect, of course, but with everything going on, it was a perfect choice for us.
Next year, since I am going back to work, Theron will be going to a brick and mortar school. Even though we will still have a stay at home parent (It’s Max’s turn!), he doesn’t feel that he is equipped to do homeschool even if it’s partnered with K12.
Even though we loved our year with K12 online education, we are excited for Theron to make some new friends and experience a brick and mortar school again next year.
